Tinubu’s policies causing untold pains, distress for Nigerians, economy — Atiku

• FG replies,says PDP can’t wrest power through back door

By Lateef Ibrahim, Abuja

Former Vice President and presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the last general election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar has listed reasons why the Nigerian economy, under the present administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has not been able to find its footing.

Atiku has similarly stated that the wrong policies of the Tinubu’s administration has continued to cause untold pain and distress on the economy and the people.

The former Vice President however declared that he and others cannot keep quiet when, clearly, the government has demonstrated sufficient poverty of ideas to redeem the situation.

The former Vice President said this on a message on his Twitter handle on Sunday.

Atiku, in offering reasons for his claimed poor showing of the nation’s economy, pointed out that President Tinubu’s new policy foreign exchange (FX) management policy was hurriedly put together without proper plans and consultations with stakeholders.

The government, he added, failed to anticipate or downplayed the potential and real negative consequences of its actions.

According to him, “Tinubu’s new policy FX management policy was hurriedly put together without proper plans and consultations with stakeholders.

“The government failed to anticipate or downplayed the potential and real negative consequences of its actions.

“The Government did not allow the CBN the independence to design and implement a sound FX Management Policy that would have dealt with such issues as increasing liquidity, curtailing/regulating demand, dealing with FX backlogs and rate convergence.

I firmly believe that if and when the Government is ready to open itself to sound counsels, as well as control internal bleedings occasioned by corruption and poorly negotiated foreign loans, the Nigerian economy would begin to find a footing again.

“The wrong policies of the Tinubu administration continue to cause untold pain and distress on the economy and the rest of us cannot keep quiet when, clearly, the government has demonstrated sufficient poverty of ideas to redeem the situation”, he said.

The PDP presidential candidate noted with sadness that during a recent meeting called at the instance of the President on Thursday to address the Foreign Exchange crisis and the problem of economic downturn, among others, “Bola Tinubu failed, yet again, to showcase any concrete policy steps that his administration is taking to contain the crises of currency fluctuation and poverty that face the country.

“Rather, he told the country and experts who have been offering ideas on how to resolve the crisis that he and his team should not be distracted and allowed time to continue cooking their cocktail that has brought untold hardship to the people of Nigeria. I don’t agree with that.

“The wrong policies of the Tinubu administration continue to cause untold pain and distress on the economy and the rest of us cannot keep quiet when, clearly, the government has demonstrated sufficient poverty of ideas to redeem the situation.

“If the government will not hold on to their usual hubris, there are ways that the country can walk out of the current crisis.

“After a careful assessment of the state of our economy at the twilights of the last administration, I knew full well that the economy of the country was heading for the ditch and came up with a number of policy prescriptions that would rescue the country from getting into the mess that we are currently in”, he stressed.